


It Should Be Enough

by Deannie



Series: Dear Love [9]
Category: The Sentinel
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1997-09-25
Updated: 1997-09-25
Packaged: 2017-12-31 12:19:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1031642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Go back to the beginning. Blair let's Jim walk him through learning to move on without him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It Should Be Enough

"Blair?"

The younger man turned to Simon, tears finally welling up in his eyes. "God, Simon! How could he..." He hung his head, and his whisper was tortured. "What am I going to do now?"

Simon stepped forward, gathering the sobbing man in his arms. Others could take care of the crime scene, the bodies, the interviewing of witnesses. He had a more important charge--one that Jim Ellison had put into his hands almost a year ago.

Blair Sandburg had changed a lot in the past six years--but not in any of the important ways. At thirty-five, he was still the rambunctious, wild-haired kid that Jim had slipped into the department under the door...

And he still took things just as hard.

Jim had been right. A year ago--almost to the week--Jim had sat in Simon's office, exhuasted and unshaven, and explained to his friend just exactly what he was asking. The first pouch of letters had been followed two months later by a second, and Jim had taken that first group, and burned them in the fireplace while Blair was at the movies. Another had followed four months after that, and another just two months ago--updates of Jim's love for his partner.

And Simon had taken each with the reverence due it. Jim had hoped that these letters, along with stories of his own life, would be enough for Blair to move on.

But looking at the small, defeated man in his arms, Simon didn't know if that was going to be enough.

When they had pronounced Jim at the scene, Simon had somehow expected some sort of display from Blair. The two had been lovers for almost four years, and it had surprised Simon that Sandburg didn't fall apart on the spot.

But, in a way, he guessed he had. It had taken all of Simon's strength just to move the smaller man away from his partner while the coroner took over, and Blair had been completely silent as Simon drove him home.

Only now, in  _their_  loft, could Blair begin to mourn his lover.

The anthropologist pushed away from him, wiping shyly at his eyes. "I'm sorry, man... Look, thanks for taking me home, I just... I couldn't--"

Simon nodded, his hands still on Sandburg's shoulders. "I'll stay, if you want."

Blair shook his head immediately. "No. No, Simon, that's okay. I just..." The tears started again, and he suddenly didn't have the strength to push them away. "God..."

Simon led him to the couch, pushing him down. "I'll stay."

* * *

**_Three weeks later..._ **

Simon looked up from his paperwork to see Blair Sandburg at his office door. He hadn't seen the man in a week, and he was surprised at the change in him.

Banks had never realised that it was truly possible to die from grief.

"Hi, Simon," Blair said, slouching into a seat, the dull light in his eyes matching the dull tone of his voice. "You wanted to see me?"

Simon nodded, opening a drawer in his desk. "Do you remember the Thurman case?"

Blair nodded. "Yeah," he remarked unenthusiastically. "How could I forget?"

The pouch in hand, Simon moved to lean on his desk in front of Sandburg. "Jim never forgot it, either."

Blair perked up at his lover's name, but that was all. He almost gasped in surprise as Simon tossed the pouch into his lap. "He started writing those for you the first night you were in the hospital."

"What...?"

"He wanted you to read them when you were ready," Simon explained with a sigh. "I think you  _need_  to be ready now."

* * *

Blair dreamed of Jim that night and woke up crying. But he also woke to another letter.

As he stood by the stove, watching the kettle boil, he could smell their shampoo. It smelled like Jim to him. They'd only started using it a few months ago--when Jim had run out of shampoo for himself, and had had to use Blair's.

Blair smiled at the memory. They'd had an easy day of paperwork, but Jim had been unusually quiet. When they got home, he'd attacked Blair immediately.

"What!?" Blair asked, pushing past his lover's lips as they sought to smother him.

"I've been smelling  _you_  all day," Jim had whispered huskily. "And it's driving me  _crazy!_ "

The sex had been  _so_  good that night, and he had joked that Jim should use his shampoo more often, if nights like  _that_  were going to be the norm. It really had been a joke, but Jim had always insisted that they both use the blue bottle--and  _only_  on the mornings after they'd  _really_  made love.

 

The kettle was boiling, and he set his tea to steep, sitting at the table and picking up Jim's letter again.

The jetty... He knew the one Jim meant, and he rose stiffly to pull on some clothes, before setting off on the hour and a half stroll...

* * *

The walk to and from the jetty had given him time to think.

Jim had been right. There really  _was_  no truly public place at 3 a.m. Blair had been so nervous about the whole thing, but Jim had made him feel completely at ease. They were celebrating, after all. They were both clean, both negative, and Jim was finally recovered from that shooting with Schiavelli.

God, he'd been so sure the night that happened... So sure that he would never see Jim alive again. He'd tried to deny it, tried to pretend that two bullets in the chest didn't mean...

But somehow, Jim had pulled through--for  _him_ \--and his Sentinel had laid him down in that dew-freezing grass... And just the feeling of Jim's naked cock buried deep within himself...

 _Please don't let it break you,_  Jim had written. How? How do I not let this break me, Jim? How can you leave me alone, and then ask me to go on?

But somehow, he had to. He needed to follow Jim's instructions... For as long as he could. Tonight... He'd read the letter for tonight, and then...

* * *

_What would our lives have been like if we had never met?_

It didn't bear thinking about. Jim had to have known, when he wrote those words, that Blair would have been nothing without him. A drifter, a neo-hippie... Jim had defined Blair's life for so long now that the anthropologist couldn't imagine himself at all without Jim by his side.

Which was why, after this letter...

He needed to go upstairs first, though. Jim was asking him, and he hadn't refused Jim in years.

* * *

He curled into a ball and cried until dawn. He couldn't dream of Jim tonight. He tried, but everytime he closed his eyes, he saw that smile on Jim's face. He'd been right, all those months ago. The light in Jim's eyes when he watched Blair play with himself  _had_  been understanding.

He'd always known that Blair was doing it for him, and somehow, that made Blair miss him all the more. But he couldn't give in just yet. Jim had said please.  _When you wake up,_ please _read the next letter._

And so he had to. Becuase Jim had asked him.

He rolled off of their bed, and walked to the desk where he kept Jim's letters.

* * *

He'd never made eggs quite as well as Jim had. His were always a little too runny, or a little too well-cooked. But he ate them, and he read Jim's letter.

"Please, Jim," he whispered. "Please don't ask me to do this."

But it was already done. He dragged himself upstairs and donned his clothes, and felt a hole in his gut because he wouldn't hear from Jim again until tomorrow morning.

* * *

Simon opened the office door quietly, ushering Sandburg in.

"Jim wanted me to come," Blair stated simply.

Simon nodded in response. "He was worried about you, Sandburg. When Schiavelli almost took him out, he began to wonder what you'd do if he was gone." He pegged the kid with mock-serious eyes. "He figured you'd probably do something  _stupid._ "

Blair chuckled slightly, and left Simon amazed. But in Blair's mind were Jim's words.  _If you laugh now, know that I'll be laughing with you._

"You changed him a lot, Sandburg," Simon said finally. "I know you liked to think that he never changed at all, but..."

* * *

Blair woke reluctantly, feeling a dream tugging at him. Not a dream, really, a memory...

Jim's cabin was too remote to worry much about monitoring their behavior. So they just didn't. They fished and they hiked and they made love under a full moon. And in the morning, they went fishing.

Well,  _Blair_  went fishing, actually--fishing  _Jim_  out of the creek. He'd panicked when he'd pulled him out and Jim wasn't breathing. Though it had only taken seconds to clear Jim's airway, Blair had held onto him for dear life, letting go only when Jim had suggested that they move the party to a more comfortable venue.

Now, Blair was alone in their loft, with the phantom feeling of his lover in his arms. He picked up the next letter, hearing Jim's voice as he read...

He laughed at the first line. "No, Jim," he whispered. "As always, you timed this perfectly."

No. Jim,  _no!_  He couldn't have the guys over! He couldn't have Rafe and Brown and Joel and Simon and  _not_  Jim!

"Tell them I told you to." It was the only thing Jim could have said to make him do it.

* * *

Blair hung up the phone after making plans for the poker night with Simon, and sat angrily on the edge of the dining room table. "Man," he told the air. "I am starting to get  _seriously_ pissed off with you trying to run my life from the grave here, Jim."

He sighed, pulling on his jacket and heading for the University. He hadn't really been able to decide where to go yesterday. The department was his office just as much as Rainier was. So, one of them one day, one of them the other....

* * *

He was amazed that the dean was so understanding. While he'd taken the semester as an impromptu sabbatical, Dean Hillary had told him that he'd love to see the newest of their tenured professors give a few lectures.

Blair was sure that somewhere, Jim was laughing at him, when Hillary asked him to take over for Professor Eisenstein that afternoon.

"You planned this, right, Jim?" Blair muttered under his breath as he headed for his office to plan an illuminating lecture on the joys of fifth century Arabic civilisation. "Thanks, lover. I _really_  appreciate this!"

* * *

At home that night, Blair broke out another bottle of beer and reread Jim's letter. As he got to the end, a sudden anger built up in him, and he found his beer bottle flying through the air toward the fireplace.

"God damnit!" He whirled around, taking in their home with more awareness than he had shown since Jim's death. "How can I do this, Jim!?" he cried out viciously. "How can you just _fucking_  leave me here!?"

He collapsed at his own question, collapsed into the couch and curled up in pain. How can you leave? How can you make me stay here alone?

Sleep came quickly, but the dreams were vivid and punishing, and Blair woke in the morning more exhausted than he had been when he fell asleep.

* * *

Simon called at seven-thirty, asking if Blair wanted to join him for breakfast. The anthropologist wanted to say no, but he couldn't find it in his heart to do so.

They met at a little cafe on the waterfront--Jim's favorite place. Blair felt uncomfortable going in without his lover, but Simon smiled kindly and waved him over to his seat.

"What," Blair asked, slightly miffed. "Did Jim leave  _you_  a set of notes, too?"

Simon smiled a little wider. "Yes, actually."

The captain relaxed as Blair chuckled. Second time in a week, Simon thought, happy to hear the sound.

"He always was controlling," Blair offered, sipping at the coffee Simon had had waiting for him.

"More than you know," Simon agreed. He launched into a story about Ellison's first year in Major Crimes. He'd been Vice's bad boy, and Simon hadn't expected much from him. Just the kind to do his job, put in his hours, and as long as nobody bothered him, Jim didn't care.

Blair was surprised. That wasn't the Jim Ellison  _he_  knew.

"Jim changed a lot when he found you, Sandburg," Simon told him quietly. "Long before you became lovers, you know?"

"Yeah," Blair whispered into his coffee.

"Anyway," Simon continued, idly wondering when his eggs and bacon were finally going to arrive. "Jim was working on this series of mob killings. Gun-runners, drug dealers, the usual..."

They talked away for an hour and a half, Simon watching in worry as he thought he saw Blair begin to open up. He really hadn't managed to get through to the kid since Jim had died, but today, Blair seemed a little more at ease with him.

The captain remembered the words from Jim's letter:

_You know, Simon, Blair really likes you. I know he's a pain sometimes, but he just... You've got 'Captain' written across your ass, sir, and he doesn't always know how to respond to you._

Blair stood up, looking at his watch. "Oh, man, Simon... I have a class to lecture in twenty minutes. I'll barely make it to campus!"

Simon almost dropped his coffee cup. "A  _class?_ "

Blair ducked his head sheepishly as he slipped into his coat. "Yeah... I figured I should see if I could pick up a few classes, help the department out this semester, you know?"

Simon beamed. How Jim had managed to know  _exactly_  what his lover would need when he was gone, the captain had no clue... But it was good to see the kid getting back to normal.

"That's good," he told Sandburg encouragingly. "Hey? We still on for poker next Sunday?"

"Yeah, Simon," Blair spoke quietly, a regret hanging in his voice. "We're still on."

Simon sipped his coffee, watching the kid get to his car and pull out of the lot. Not one hundred percent yet... But getting there.

"Jim," he whispered, glancing briefly at the ceiling. "You were a genius."

* * *

Blair stumbled into the loft quietly. Time for another note. Time for another of Jim's schedules.

He'd realised, in the middle of his lecture on ancient Grecian economic structures, that that was what Jim was doing. A series of letters, well spaced... Just enough time in between them to push Blair into trying to live his life again.

"Jim," he said, heading for the fridge. "You're an asshole, you know that?"

But he had been  _Blair's_  asshole.

He grabbed his beer and sat at the table, opening the letter.

_Did you think about it?_

Shit. No, Jim, I didn't. He was supposed to have thought about their first night together, but between Simon at breakfast, and the lectures he'd been picking up at the University...

"Son of a  _bitch!_ " He stood up, more in shock than in anger. Jim was trying to make sure that Blair stayed busy... So he wouldn't wallow.

"You, my love," Sandburg spoke to the air, raising his beer bottle in toast. "You were a fucking genius!"

He smiled, grinning wider when he realised that he'd been able to say "were" without  _too_  much sadness.

"Okay, Jim," he said out loud, moving to sit on the sofa. "Our first night..."

The letter wasn't so bad--until he got to the part where Jim threw his own words back at him:

 _"I want you to be inside me now! I've never wanted anything else so much in my life--and I can't_ wait _until we get upstairs."_

He tried, but he couldn't laugh at the next paragraph.

God, he'd thought it was finally getting better! He'd thought that, the last couple of days, he was finally going to be able to make it. He hadn't really  _wanted_  to before that, but he knew that was what Jim wanted.

But his body ached now. He missed the feeling of Jim inside him. He gazed at the stairs in longing, remembering the unbelievable pain of his first time with a man. His first time with his _only_  man.

"God, Jim! Why are you doing this to me!?"

He read on, tears blinding him from time to time...

_But now...? Love, I want you to move on. Just because I'm not there, doesn't mean I can't see you be happy... I need to see you happy. Please? For me, Love?_

"I can't, Jim," Blair whispered painfully. "Please. It's too hard. I  _can't!_ "

And then Jim was apologising, admitting what a selfish bastard he could be. He was asking Blair to go up to the Reservoir this weekend. And all Blair wanted was to  _be_  with Jim. Really be with him. Body  _and_  soul.

_I want you to be there when you read my next letter._

"Okay, Jim," he whispered, curling on to the couch--not able to stand the idea of being in their bed alone. "One last time. But then you won't have to wait for me anymore."

* * *

Simon spent a little time with Blair everyday. The kid took a while to open up to him, but the day after Jim had asked Blair to go up to the Reservoir, the kid exploded.

"Look, Simon! I'm really impressed with your devotion to duty and all that, but leave me the  _hell_  alone!"

"Blair, please--"

"No!  _God!_ " He batted angrily at his tears as he lurched to his feet. "Damnit, it's not bad enough he ran my life when he was alive! Now he's got to do it from the grave!"

"Sandburg, he loved you."

"If he loved me, he wouldn't be trying to manipulate me like this!"

Simon stood up, putting a hand on Sandburg's shoulder. "Jim only wanted me to help you--"

Blair twisted out of his grip and headed for the door, not even bothering to grab a coat against the chill evening weather.

"Well, you know what, Simon?" he whispered harshly. "He doesn't have the right anymore.  _He's_  the one who left  _me!_ "

* * *

Blair walked until his legs hurt, coming to rest at  _their_  jetty. His anger hadn't waned, and it kept him warm as it started to rain in the oncoming twilight.

"Damnit, Jim." He walked right up to the edge of the jetty, looking down into the dark water below. "I wasn't meant to deal with this alone, man. You were supposed to  _be_  here!" His whisper was full of tears. "You were supposed to be here forever."

He watched the water for a time, wondering if, in the end, he'd really have the guts to go through with it. He didn't  _want_  to live without Jim... But he didn't think he could just end it.

Jim had gotten under his skin, he guessed with a laugh.

"All right, Big Guy," he whispered to the waves. "One more time. I'll do this for you  _one more time_... But then..."

He turned his back on the ocean, and made his way slowly back to the loft.

* * *

He was sure it would be empty--Simon wouldn't have stayed around after that blowup, but there he was, pacing the floors in the dark as he waited for Blair to return.

"Where the  _hell_  did you go, Sandburg?!" the captain grated angrily. "I thought I was going to have to put an APB out on you."

Unbidden, Blair's anger swelled again. "Don't worry about me, Simon. I'm just  _fine._ "

"Uh-huh." Simon looked the younger man up and down, and realised that Blair was no better off now than he had been the night Jim died. "Look, Blair... I know this is hard for you--hell, it's hard for all of us--but you've got to get over this." He approached, laying a comforting hand on Blair's shoulder. "He's gone."

Blair's eyes, when they finally rose to greet Simon's, were bleak and bloodshot. "But he's still here, isn't he, Simon?"

The larger man had nothing to say in response. Finally, he whispered quietly, "Yeah, Blair... He's still here."

* * *

Simon felt a little foolish. Here he was--on a day off--pulling surveillance on a young man who used to be one of his own. No. No, Blair still  _was_  one of his own. A kid who had started out as an annoyance, moved invisibly to a mascot, and from there, finally, to a trusted friend.

Six years. A long time to have a man around. You got to know them, eventually. None of Simon's detectives was less than a friend now, and Blair was something else entirely. A little brother, maybe? Something...

He shook his head to clear it, and used his binoculars to focus back in on the lone figure before a tent that perched itself at the edge of the falls.

So close... If Jim was wrong, if Sandburg actually meant this to be the end... Simon was far too far away to help him. Making a quick decision--based much more on his heart's thoughts than on his head's--he packed away the binoculars and moved closer.

* * *

> _I love you,  
>  Jim_

"But you didn't love me enough, Big Guy," Blair whispered to the forest around him, his tears turning themselves to sobs now as he sat back and looked at the stars. "You couldn't love me enough to  _stay!_ "

Of its own accord, his body moved forward, toward the edge of the cliff. Not seriously, not with any real purpose... It simply had a mind of its own.

* * *

Simon reached the campsite just as Blair began to move forward, and something in the older man's heart froze. Jim was wrong. The height didn't seem to matter to Sandburg now. Nothing did. He stopped, silent, as he heard the younger man's words.

"God, Jim, why couldn't you love me enough to stay?"

"Nobody can, Sandburg," Simon said quietly, watching Blair turn slowly to face him. "I never saw him love someone else the way he loved you, but even that isn't enough."

"But it  _should_  be!" Blair sobbed angrily. "It  _should_  be enough! It was enough for me--when Thurman shot me." He stepped forward unsteadily, nearly falling into Simon's arms as he cried. "Why can't it be enough for  _him?_ "

"I don't know, Sandburg," Simon whispered, gathering the kid into his arms and resting both of their bodies on the cold ground. "Maybe God needs it to be this way."

"Then God sucks!" Blair announced petulantly.

Simon couldn't help the chuckle that escaped him then. That had sounded so much like the Blair of old, that wise-cracking, fast-thinking Blair that Simon and all the rest of Blair's friends had missed for so long...

He pulled the younger man tighter, and looked up at the stars. Somewhere up there, Jim was smiling.

"Yeah, kid," Simon whispered. "Maybe so. But He brought you and Jim together in the first place, didn't He?"

Sandburg sniffled quietly, turning his head to peer up at the captain. "Okay, so He doesn't suck  _too_  much." He burrowed back down. "God, Simon... Why is this so hard?"

"It gets easier," Simon murmured back, recalling Jim's first letter and its words of comfort. "I promise you... It gets easier..."

And that night, wrapped in the arms of a friend and the thoughts of a lover, Blair could almost believe that that was true.

* * *  
The End


End file.
